After a breakout role in last year’s Sing Street, Lucy Boynton is returning to the world of music with 2018’s Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody. The Hollywood Reporter broke the story, revealing that Boynton will portray Mary Austin, the longtime girlfriend of frontman Freddie Mercury.
Austin and Mercury were in a relationship from 1970 to 1976, which ended when she learned that he was homosexual, but the two stayed friends until Mercury’s untimely death in 1991. The iconic artist wrote 1975’s “Love of My Life” about Austin and once called her “the only friend I’ve got” in a 1985 interview.
The film will chronicle Queen’s rise to fame, leading up to the band’s Live Aid performance in 1985 at Wembley Stadium, which many have called the greatest live performance in the history of rock music, thanks to the unparalleled brilliance and electricity of Mercury.
Boynton has also starred in The Blackcoat’s Daughter, Gypsy and Don’t Knock Twice, and will round out 2017 with turns in Rebel in the Rye and Murder on the Orient Express.
A recently released image gave us a glimpse at Mr. Robot star Rami Malek as the influential “Don’t Stop Me Now” and “Killer Queen” singer and songwriter; the rest of the cast includes Ben Hardy (X-Men: Apocalypse) as drummer Roger Taylor, Gwilym Lee (Midsomer Murders) as lead guitarist Brian May, Joe Mazzello (Justified) as bass guitarist John Deacon and Allen Leech (Downton Abbey) as Mercury’s personal manager Paul Prenter.
Bryan Singer is back in the director’s chair following 2016’s X-Men: Apocalypse, and Justin Haythe (The Lone Ranger) and Anthony McCarten (The Theory of Everything) have penned the script. The film is due out on December 25th, 2018.
Originally published September 6, 2017. Updated April 17, 2018.
